The day itself consisted of two parallel strands: a hackday and, in the afternoon, an unconference, both looking at encouraging links between data repositories such as museums, broadcasters and the wider community, eg data.gov.uk.

At the end of the day both strands were brought together for a session where developers showed of the fruits of their hackday labours.

Demonstrators from all parts of the country were joined by many of the radio station’s presenters, including Lauren Laverne, Tom Robinson, Liz Kershaw, Gideon Coe, Andrew Collins and Adam Buxton.

During one of the speeches, Tom Robinson made a point that hadn’t occurred to me about the proposals. He said the radio plans covering 6 Music and the Asian Network are part of a larger project that is fundamentally about marketing.

He said the management view was that the current branding is too confusing for listeners with too many station names. Therefore the plan is to have Radios 1 to 5, with related stations named 1Xtra, 2Xtra, etc.

No surprise given the marketing background of Tim Davie, BBC Director of Audio and Music.

Along with the speeches, there was also musical entertainment from The Coal Porters, Mirrorkicks, Black Soul Strangers, The Brute Chorus and Allo Darlin’.

Support was also given to the campaigns to oppose the closure of the Asian Network and cuts to the BBC website during the event.

At the conclusion of the gathering Adam Buxton summed up its purpose with the chant:

WordPress – Simon Dickson led a session on the use of WordPress in government, outlining its expanding use, starting with the Wales Office, then Number 10, to it’s current deployment in government. Steph Gray spoke on his experience in using WordPress when rebuilding his departmental website in a few days when BIS was brought into existence. The speed of deployment and flexibility of WordPress, though the use of plugins, was a common theme through the session. I, of course, pointed those present to WordCamp UK to find out more and meet WordPress users and developers from across the country.

Making the political sell: gaining support for innovation in political organisations – a session on making the case for digital engagement against a background of cuts. Steph Gray spoke on surviving 2010, whilst Anthony Zacharzewski presented making the political sell. In the current climate some areas of government might see digital engagement as an easy area to cut back without any significant impact – a mistaken approach in my view.

One of the outcomes of the day is the possibility of organising an event around internal communications and collaboration.

Many thanks to Dave Briggs for organising a great day, Google for hosting the event at their offices, the sponsors for their support and not forgetting Hadley Beeman for arranging evening drinks in local licensed premises!